Downtown Architecture: The Best, the Worst

1201 Pennsylvania Avenue: Putty must have been all the rage in the early 1980s, and this edifice is even worse-looking than its Vermont Avenue doppelganger, with a long blank wall on 12th Street that totally deadens the space between lively E Street and Pennsylvania.

It's easy to complain about downtown's uninspired, Height-Act-flattened boxy office buildings. And much of the disdain is deserved. But there are a good number of really excellent buildings downtown as well--so after a bit of trashing, we'll move on to some examples.